The Belltower: Alumni News

At the end of this year, Kathi (Frost) Bierwirth ’81 will retire from Burr and Burton Academy after nearly 40 years of teaching, coaching, leading and supporting students. Kathi has the rare gift of being a person who always knew that she wanted to make Burr and Burton her life’s work. 

 

Mark Slade ’02 always knew that the Northshire would be his home. Despite being drawn to travel and adventure, Mark never questioned whether or not he would make Manchester the place he chose to live, work, and raise his family. Mark’s mother, Bonnie Baird Oulette Slade is a 1967 graduate of Burr and Burton, and Mark married his high school sweetheart, Kate (Coniglio) Slade ’02. You might say that Burr and Burton runs through Mark’s veins, as he and Kate have four children, and their oldest is currently a ninth-grader at Burr and Burton. 

Work in international development felt as natural to Meg Chandler ’13 as going to work for the family business. Born in Bangkok, and spending her early years in Burma, Meg and her brother James ’10 moved with their family to Dorset in 1999. After watching her parents dedicate their careers to international service, Meg said she always knew that she would spend her career in a similar way. 

Bryan Dalton ’81 knew early on that he wanted a career abroad. His family moved to Manchester, Vermont from California in 1972 when he was in fourth grade. At Burr and Burton, Bryan found that his talent and interest lay in “the power of language,” encouraged by Harvey Dorfman in English, and the strong world language department. He graduated from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in 1985 and served as an intern with the non-governmental organization Africare in Niamey, Niger. After a year’s stint as a temp worker living with his parents, from 1987-2015 Bryan was a Foreign Service Officer with the U.S. State Department, serving in Mexico, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, Washington DC (first in the Africa Bureau, later dealing with international parental child abductions), New York City (International Visitor Leadership Program), Romania, and India, and in Bulgaria as Deputy Chief of Mission.

 

Throughout his life and career, Bryan felt the tension of what he called a cloud of not being able to be yourself, navigating the dicey waters of the early years working for the State Department during a time of secrecy and open hostility that surrounded him and anyone who was gay, lesbian, bisexual or gender non-conforming. In 1991, Bryan was unceremoniously outed by a colleague, which set him on a course of advocacy for equal rights for LGBTQ personnel in the U.S. State Department. He helped co-found Gays and Lesbians in Foreign Affairs Agencies (GLIFAA) in 1992. As of its 30th anniversary this year, GLIFAA now has more than 1,200 members across a dozen federal agencies addressing discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. The history of GLIFAA describes the first meetings at members’ homes:  “Worry hung in the air, as those present knew that the State Department’s security office was investigating personnel thought to be gay and driving them out of government service.”

It’s hard to find a more celebrated moment in U.S. history than NASA during the early days of the space race. And Hollywood most certainly agrees, having churned out scores of biopics elevating and celebrating the brilliant minds who first placed Armstrong on the moon. Before that “one small step for man” in 1969, there were countless hours of scientific theory, space instrument creation, and many other spacecraft sent up to observe and report on the great beyond. 

There are alumni, and then there are alumni. You know the ones - they spend their lives celebrating and elevating their school, by coaching, teaching, volunteering, and even sending their children and grandchildren to their alma mater. There are few in Burr and Burton’s 193-year history whose DNA is so indelibly intertwined with the school as Ben Beers ’61. 

This year, Ben celebrated his 62nd year as a member of the facilities staff, starting as a part-time, after-school employee when his mother was ill in 1959 and moving to full-time after graduation. Ben famously boasts that he got married on a Saturday, graduated on a Sunday, and started his full-time career at Burr and Burton on Monday. 

Terrell Williams ’97 grew up in Newark, NJ, and attended BBA for four years. He graduated from the University of Vermont with honors in 2001, and earned his Master's degree in clinical social work in 2008 from Bryn Mawr. He works as a school social worker at Imhotep Institute Charter High School in Philadelphia, and teaches a History of Hip Hop class virtually for BBA, alongside BBA social studies teachers Pete Nicholson and Andrew Cassarino. Terrell lives in the Mount Airy neighborhood of Philadelphia with his fiancé and their nine-child blended family.

Clem Wright ‘05 grew up in South Londonderry, a self-described “‘Over the Mountain’ kid.” After graduating in 2005, Clem went on to Harvard to earn a degree in English, and after college, he worked at a malaria non-profit in Sierra Leone before moving to San Francisco to work for Google. We sat down with Clem to talk about his work, his trajectory, and some of his favorite BBA moments that led him to where he is today.

Megan Beattie-Cassan ‘99 knows Burr and Burton from multiple angles: She’s an alum, she’s the current school nurse, and next year, she’ll also be a BBA parent. As the school nurse in the time of a global pandemic, Beattie-Cassan’s expertise has been a critical to both BBA’s reopening in the fall of 2020 and the successful prevention of the spread of COVID on campus.  We caught up with Beattie-Cassan in late May to learn more about her many connections to BBA.

From the forthcoming winter VIEW: Burr and Burton alum Colin O’Leary ‘09 was in the middle of a Ph.D. studying respiratory viruses when the COVID-19 pandemic began in early 2020.  Read about how the pandemic affected his research, why he came to study virology, and his hopes for the future of public health.